


Starlight and Night Lights

by elysiontower



Series: i wanted gueimeis fics so i threw darts at prompt generators [2]
Category: Promare (2019)
Genre: Headcanon, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, Pre-Canon, Pre-Slash, Running Away, Stargazing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:21:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25908796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elysiontower/pseuds/elysiontower
Summary: Escaping Miami after Gueira's first flare, the pair can only find shelter in a field under the cover of constellations.
Relationships: Gueira/Meis (Promare)
Series: i wanted gueimeis fics so i threw darts at prompt generators [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1672507
Comments: 4
Kudos: 29





	Starlight and Night Lights

“Y’think this is far enough?”

Gueira's eyes snapped up, half-conscious daze broken as he bumped into Meis, who stopped in front of him. 

He took a moment to observe his surroundings: arid sands colored ocean-blue by the night, stretched out as far as he could see, interrupted only by the looming, black shadows of immense stone formations and ruins of old buildings from before the Great World Blaze. It scared him to think what had happened to the people within at the time. For their sakes, and for a bit of his own, Gueira hoped that they had gotten out in time. His own flames flickered idly in his palm, just for a moment, and he clenched his fists closed- no; not now.

As for distance, the ache in his legs was signal enough that they'd walked far. It had been hours at  _ best _ since they were last on the highway, Meis electing to ditch his motorcycle a part of the way.

" _ We can find it again in the morning, if we have to _ ," he had insisted. Considering the circumstances, even that felt too optimistic. " _ It's not going to do us much good now anyways." _

That was the plan they decided on, anxious and exhausted, to catch a break through all the panic: hide under the blanket of night. Cities and roads could get them caught, headlights just a beacon for anyone that would recognize them from the news. After nearly nineteen years on Earth, surrounded by street lamps and pavement, civilization was suddenly all too willing to become their enemy. 

Well, maybe that wasn't as new to him as he used to think. Maybe it was why he was in,  _ became _ this whole mess in the first place. 

In hindsight, the cold glow of Miami's lamp posts and street signs always did feel so distant.

"Here seems good, yeah."

That confirmation was all Meis needed to start towards a boulder, settling against it. Gueira's steps, however, were hesitant. Approaching his friend, he was unsure of himself; the obvious answer was to just sit down, right? But should he take a place right there, next to him, or did he not deserve to? He had hurt this boy enough, had dragged him out of his life and into hell. He would just hurt him more, right?

There were too many questions for Gueira to focus on, none too coherent as they melted together and weighed his thoughts down like hot lead. He was pretty sure Meis was looking up at him, perhaps expectantly, but it was difficult to make out his expression. He couldn't really think too hard about it.

Gueira heard a tapping noise, and his hesitation was broken when he noticed Meis's silhouette patting the space next to him, and the fog in his mind cleared just enough to register the invitation. 

"Man, it's colder than I expected," he heard as he sat down. 

"...It is?"

"How could you not…" Meis's voice trailed off, realization dawning in his tone. "Oh. I guess now you're not  _ gonna _ feel cold anymore, huh."

"Oh, right." Was that how it worked? He'd say it made sense, but that felt like a stretch considering nothing  _ else _ did. "I guess."

Gueira made out the shoulders on Meis's shadow shifting in a shrug, and the silence settled from there. 

His life was a joke, when he thought about it. Surrounded by groups of dumb teenagers and shitty tourists, under the artificial city lights, and he could never get himself out of his own head. Before he knew it, he was going up in flames- taking the face of the boy he loved in his hand, burning him.

And yet. And yet… And  _ yet. _

That boy still helped him. He risked his own freedom, his very  _ life  _ to save him, took his palms still ablaze and had the  _ audacity _ to trust him. Saying that he wouldn't hurt him. Even now, he welcomed him to sit by his side under the open sky. With just the two of them, alone beneath the blanket of stars, two stupid teenagers on the run from more troubles than they deserved, and yet it was then that Gueira felt strangely… at ease. Like he was finally safe.

It had to be the exhaustion setting in. Running for their lives wasn't exactly the best time to be feeling safe, right? Once that adrenaline wore off it'd be straight back to paranoid thoughts, aching joints, and panicked breaths. Nothing felt real in that moment, but the alternative would soon be worse.

Still better than "home", at least. His eyelids felt heavy.

"Hey, Gueira." The words were a tentative whisper. "You still awake?"

"Yeah."

"Oh." What was he expecting? "Sorry."

"Do you want your jacket back?" he offered. Gueira was still clutching it, only vaguely aware of how his thumbs stroked the leather; when they fled Miami, it was the only comforting thing Meis knew to give him to help ground him. Now, however, he was conscious enough to recognize when Meis needed it more. 

Though it seemed his friend had different ideas. "Nah, you can keep it. I'll just…"

Meis sidled up to him, slipping himself under Gueira's arm and tucking his head into the crook of his neck. "God, yeah, you're warmer than I expected." 

"Am I your fuckin' heater now?"

"At this point? I'm not about to say no," he chuckled. "I could get used to this."

Gueira let out a halfhearted huff, more amused than anything, but nonetheless found his arms wrapping themselves around Meis's thin frame and pulling him close. His friend was cold to the touch, curling up into Gueira's side until his shivers gradually ceased. 

The side of Meis's face brushed against his neck, and when they both felt the other stiffen at the contact, the thin crack in their peace became piercing shards in Gueira’s mind. Meis knew, just as well, that he had felt the rough, uneven texture of damaged skin; a reminder of what he'd become. 

_ Are you sure I'm safe _ was on the tip of his tongue, but as he began to speak-

"Don't. Don't… say it."

"What?"

"I don't want to think about it right now."

_ You didn't hurt me _ , was only implied, left to permeate in the air between them.  _ None of this is on you. _

_ I did, though. _

"Just… Let's just stay like this. At least for now."

Gueira took a breath in, letting it out in a sigh, before nodding. "Yeah. Okay." 

Oh, how he wished he could enjoy this. There he was, under a romantic star-filled sky, holding his  _ longtime crush _ in his arms! But of course it couldn't be just that, he was  _ him _ : the freak who couldn't keep it together, who stupidly believed he had any right to be  _ sick  _ of how his life turned out, and only knew how to drag the people he loved into his messes. All because he was the exact shitty fuck-up kid his dad told him he was, the shameful demonic curse on their family he knew his grandmother saw him as no matter what she said, the one thing Gueira had wanted was twisted to ruin the only boy that still cared about him.

God, what the fuck was wrong with him?

He rested his head atop Meis's, one hand idly playing with his friend's hair, and he wished they could have done this under better circumstances. Wished he had any right to wish, really.

"You recognize anything out here?" Meis, still awake, caught him off guard with his murmurs. 

"Huh?" 

"The stars. Or constellations, or whatever," he clarified. "You memorized 'em all better when we had to do that weird project for Earth Science. See any you remember?"

What the hell kind of a question was that for a time like this?

He looked up anyways, knowing that there was nothing else that could have greeted him but that ever-expansive field of lights. What else was there to look at? Still, it felt so new; neither of them had ever gotten far enough out of the city to escape its harsh brilliance, eating up the stars like they were nothing. Out there, the sky could light its own blaze, wisps forming the familiar shapes he'd seen in photos.

Tentatively, Gueira shifted, raising his free arm to point up. "I found the Big Dipper, I guess."

"I can't tell where you're pointing."

"Over  _ there _ , uh…" His eyes dropped to scan the desert for a landmark. "See that big rock? Look up from that." 

There was silence for one beat, two, three, four, then Meis piped up finally, "Oh, found it." 

"Uh-huh. That's all I remember off the bat out here," Gueira admitted.

"It's okay. This is still cool."

"I guess.” He looked to his friend at his side, his sight having adjusted to the darkness, and he could have sworn the starlight glittered off his night-black hair. Oh, what did he do to deserve him? “I still know what they’re called, if that’s any help."

Though his eyes weighed on him, he didn’t want to sleep. The shadows behind his eyelids wouldn’t be kind to him, not after the day they’ve been through. Memories of heat, of dust, of burning and flesh and crackling and tears and screams and  _ I’m sorry dad I’m sorry dad I’m sorry dad I’m sorry dad I’m- _

“Yeah, can you name ‘em for me?”

Meis’s cool voice settled the burning in his eyes. He couldn’t flare up, not here, not now, not again. 

His chest hurt.

“Sure.” If the other teen heard the crack in his voice, Gueira was thankful he didn’t mention it. 

Yeah, he could try that. Gueira shifted only to let his neck get comfortable, permitting just his eyes to wander in search of constellations.  _ Don't think about today. Don't think about yesterday. Don't think about tomorrow. _ The stars were there, with them, in that moment - it wouldn't hurt to accept their embrace. 

"Well, you still see it, right?" He felt Meis nod against his shoulder. "Look at the top one, where the handle is."

"Y'mean the North Star?"

"No, that's the wrong dipper."

Gueira couldn't help but giggle, just barely, at Meis's subsequent "Oh."

His friend let out a breath, almost his own laugh in response, before continuing. "So then what's the thing everyone talks about with it? With the Big Dipper."

"It points at it." Gesturing to the star in question, shining bright at the tip of the Little Dipper, Gueira's finger traced a line to the ladle of its companion. "See?"

"Uh-huh, now I get it." Meis pointed back to the first star with his hand, almost pale under the glow of the moon. "So then what's this one called?"

"Alkaid," Gueira answered. 

There was a moment of hesitation before Meis spoke up again. "...Isn't that a battery?"

"That's alkaline."

"Shit. I guess I'm tired."

No wonder why.

"We should get some shut-eye, then." Despite having suggested it, Gueira wasn't too keen on his own idea. "It'll be another long day tomorrow."

"Just a bit longer, 'kay?" his friend asked. "I wanna hear the rest of 'em still."

He almost wondered who, really, wanted to stay up more. 

"...Okay."

Their faces were close when he turned to look at Meis, the other boy having further curled himself into Gueira's side, and he could almost make out the fond smile on his face. Something about his expression made him want to get closer, his heart jumped; that… wasn't because of that, right? There were plenty of reasons to feel so anxious, right? 

"So what's after Alkaid?"

He took a deep breath as he turned back to the stars. Focus. "Well for starters, it's also called Benetnasch, but not as much. I just think Alkaid sounds better." 

Meis's laugh made his heart beat faster. "Yeah, guess that makes sense."

"Then there's Mizar, which hides a smaller star next to it called Alcor." One tiny light tucked away in another, huh? Gueira tried not to look back at his friend.

"That's kinda cute."

"Man, you're fuckin' weird. They're stars for fuck's sake."

He'll miss getting to joke like this. He went on, naming the stars from Mizar and Alcor to Alioth, to Megrez, to Phecda and Merak and Dubhe, even going on to follow Dubhe to the Little Dipper, naming Polaris and the line that succeeded it of Delta, Epsilon, Beta, and shrugging off whatever he'd forgotten, because life was too short to remember some shitty fraternity names. When Meis admitted he had turned one down, even the guilt in Gueira's heart couldn't ring when the raven-haired boy laid his head against his chest. 

Maybe, he thought as his own grin waned to a hopeful smile, he understood why Meis had asked about the stars. 

Even long after his friend was claimed by sleep, Gueira kept going. Telling old stories he remembered looking up before, about the twins Castor and Pollox in the Gemini formation, about the belt of Orion, until what little information he had faded into the superstitious. Only once he knew Meis was asleep did he bring up, voice hushed to an embarrassed whisper, about his star sign. He didn't know what to think about what he read about Virgos, it didn't feel right, but it was fine. Meis didn't seem like much of a Leo either. Sometimes websites on the internet are wrong. 

That didn't stop him from having looked up compatibility, though. He chose, perhaps for the best, to ignore what it said. As he threaded fingers through starlit hair, mind drifting from the earlier agonies of daylight, eyes heavy with exhaustion, he figured they could do just fine for themselves together. 

**Author's Note:**

> hi i had this in my docs for months without posting so i cleaned it up today, pls leave comments if ur able since i havent written in a WHILE
> 
> the prompt was "cuddling under the stars"
> 
> if u want more content with the headcanon that gueira and meis knew each other pre-burnish, check out my other fics or check out Dreamtiel's The Slowest Kinds of Burns here on ao3! im on mobile i dont know how else to link it so here https://archiveofourown.org/works/20139385/chapters/47711824


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